Goin' to the Gun Show
Don't forget to visit: MARK KNOWS IT ALL, THE WEB SITE;
www.markknowsitall.com
I keep telling my wife that there is a whole world out there we know nothing about…and I found part of that world last weekend. After two days of winter weather, Sunday broke forth glorious full of sunshine. The day started normal enough. I went to church, sang in the choir, went out for breakfast, you know…Mark things. Then my son suggested that we should do a father and son thing…”Let’s go to the gun show!!” Gun show? As in bang, bang?
The last time I shot a gun was at Camp Fitch in 1958. I scared myself, missed the target and wet my pants. They gave me a merit badge if I promised to stay off the shooting range and direct my skills towards the art and crafts tent. I still have the hammered ashtray, as well as my virginal, “no-holes in it” shooting bulls-eye…so they could show my parents that they tried.
But my son is another story. He talks about joining the FBI (he has a year before he is old enough) and has an Ohio license to carry. He knows about these things, and has his targets hanging on the back of his bedroom door along with some of his Godfather pictures. Sweet Jesus.
So off we went to the expo center in Niles. The first thing one notices is the vehicles parked in the driveway. These are man vehicles…big suckers that show just enough mud on the rocker panels to let you know they have been some place manly. These aren’t Escalades. These are hard driving, gas guzzling, header rumbling Chevy’s, Ford’s and Dodge trucks in manly colors of dark greens and maroons and browns.
Look towards the entrance of the expo center. There are the men, standing around the door smoking…with rifles over their shoulders and holding them in their hands, standing guard at the entrance in their army fatigues and camouflage outfits. No bad guys getting in here. And that person walking to the car parked next to yours…guns and camouflage. And that other person walking to the car the next row over…guns and camouflage. Look even closer, that man isn’t a man at all. It’s a woman: in camouflage, with a gun…and a 3 year old, and a 5 year old. Whatever happened to Barbie dolls and GI Joe?
When you enter the exhibition hall, you know that you are among A-muhr-icans. There ain’t no latte liberals here. These are true blue, salt of the earth, gun toting, “protect the 2nd Amendment” Americans. The bumper stickers that greet you at the first table say it all: “Fear the government that fears your gun!” and my personal favorite “Ted Kennedy’s car killed more people than my gun!” OUCH!! And...if you join the NRA, you get your $6.00 admission fee back!! What a deal!!
The array of fire power in this place was staggering. I have only seen guns like this on television. What do these folks do with them? They had Tommy guns. I didn’t know you could even buy a Tommy gun. I don’t have a gun, and I will not allow one in my house. On the other hand……
I am a member of the NRA. I joined back in the late 1990’s. I was visiting Washington DC over the Easter holiday, and I turned on the television early in the morning and saw a frightening scene that I never thought I would witness in America, and I will never forget; Janet Reno’s “cover of darkness” raid on a house in Miami seizing Elian Gonzales from his aunt and uncle to send him back to Communist Cuba; breaking down the door in the middle night with armed thugs, rifles drawn, stealing that little boy out of a closet crying in fear with the family petrified in disbelief. Never in my lifetime would I ever think to see such a thing in America. That is what the Nazi’s did, not MY government, and yet it happened.
I have a friend who had an uncle who suffered under the Nazi’s and then the Russian Communists. When he was 13, he trudged across the mountains in central Europe on foot to escape to the American sector and freedom after World War II. In his house, he had a room full of guns, top to bottom. I asked him why he had so many guns. His response: I’ll be ready when they come.
I didn’t understand what he meant by “they” until that morning in Washington DC; with the Capitol Building outside my window, watching my government terrorizing a family in Miami to send a five year old boy back to the slavery of Communism.
I thought about that trip to Washington when I saw those guys standing outside the expo center in Niles last Sunday. You know what? I think I am glad they were there.
I keep telling my wife that there is a whole world out there we know nothing about…and I found part of that world last weekend. After two days of winter weather, Sunday broke forth glorious full of sunshine. The day started normal enough. I went to church, sang in the choir, went out for breakfast, you know…Mark things. Then my son suggested that we should do a father and son thing…”Let’s go to the gun show!!” Gun show? As in bang, bang?The last time I shot a gun was at Camp Fitch in 1958. I scared myself, missed the target and wet my pants. They gave me a merit badge if I promised to stay off the shooting range and direct my skills towards the art and crafts tent. I still have the hammered ashtray, as well as my virginal, “no-holes in it” shooting bulls-eye…so they could show my parents that they tried.
But my son is another story. He talks about joining the FBI (he has a year before he is old enough) and has an Ohio license to carry. He knows about these things, and has his targets hanging on the back of his bedroom door along with some of his Godfather pictures. Sweet Jesus.
So off we went to the expo center in Niles. The first thing one notices is the vehicles parked in the driveway. These are man vehicles…big suckers that show just enough mud on the rocker panels to let you know they have been some place manly. These aren’t Escalades. These are hard driving, gas guzzling, header rumbling Chevy’s, Ford’s and Dodge trucks in manly colors of dark greens and maroons and browns.
Look towards the entrance of the expo center. There are the men, standing around the door smoking…with rifles over their shoulders and holding them in their hands, standing guard at the entrance in their army fatigues and camouflage outfits. No bad guys getting in here. And that person walking to the car parked next to yours…guns and camouflage. And that other person walking to the car the next row over…guns and camouflage. Look even closer, that man isn’t a man at all. It’s a woman: in camouflage, with a gun…and a 3 year old, and a 5 year old. Whatever happened to Barbie dolls and GI Joe?
When you enter the exhibition hall, you know that you are among A-muhr-icans. There ain’t no latte liberals here. These are true blue, salt of the earth, gun toting, “protect the 2nd Amendment” Americans. The bumper stickers that greet you at the first table say it all: “Fear the government that fears your gun!” and my personal favorite “Ted Kennedy’s car killed more people than my gun!” OUCH!! And...if you join the NRA, you get your $6.00 admission fee back!! What a deal!!
The array of fire power in this place was staggering. I have only seen guns like this on television. What do these folks do with them? They had Tommy guns. I didn’t know you could even buy a Tommy gun. I don’t have a gun, and I will not allow one in my house. On the other hand……
I am a member of the NRA. I joined back in the late 1990’s. I was visiting Washington DC over the Easter holiday, and I turned on the television early in the morning and saw a frightening scene that I never thought I would witness in America, and I will never forget; Janet Reno’s “cover of darkness” raid on a house in Miami seizing Elian Gonzales from his aunt and uncle to send him back to Communist Cuba; breaking down the door in the middle night with armed thugs, rifles drawn, stealing that little boy out of a closet crying in fear with the family petrified in disbelief. Never in my lifetime would I ever think to see such a thing in America. That is what the Nazi’s did, not MY government, and yet it happened.
I have a friend who had an uncle who suffered under the Nazi’s and then the Russian Communists. When he was 13, he trudged across the mountains in central Europe on foot to escape to the American sector and freedom after World War II. In his house, he had a room full of guns, top to bottom. I asked him why he had so many guns. His response: I’ll be ready when they come.
I didn’t understand what he meant by “they” until that morning in Washington DC; with the Capitol Building outside my window, watching my government terrorizing a family in Miami to send a five year old boy back to the slavery of Communism.
I thought about that trip to Washington when I saw those guys standing outside the expo center in Niles last Sunday. You know what? I think I am glad they were there.
Comments